Defendant Bragged, Prosecutor Says

Moments after Gerard Fleurimond was shot to death in Delray Beach, suspect Byron Young told a friend, ``I licked that Haitian twice,`` a prosecutor said on Thursday in opening trial arguments.

Young, 24, was arrested by Delray Beach police a day after the Aug. 4, 1990, shooting in the first block of Northwest Sixth Avenue.

The defense team said the eyewitness to Fleurimond`s death could not identify Young from a group of photos of potential suspects on the night of the incident.

And the man to whom Young is alleged to have sold the murder weapon -- for $50 and one piece of crack cocaine, according to police -- has a 12-year history of drug abuse, defense attorney Henry Meyer said in his opening statement.

Testimony taken on Thursday painted the neighborhood where the shooting occurred as one struggling with drugs and violence.

Those who testified believe they saw Young carrying a weapon that looked like the gun the state says was used in the shooting.

Sarah McGriff said she came out of her apartment at one point during the night of the shooting when she heard a clicking noise that sounded like a cigarette lighter.

What she found, she testified, was two women and Young, who was firing a revolver with no bullets.

``The gun was empty and he was pulling the trigger. It was going click, click, click,`` she said.

``He said he was going to rob a Haitian,`` McGriff recalled. ``I said `No, go home.``` She said he inserted bullets into the gun and walked around the building.

A short time later, she heard gunfire, possibly three shots, and looked up the street and saw Young running, she said.

Patricia Tyson, 17, said she, too, heard the gunfire from about a block away. Tyson said she and a friend tried to hide under a stairwell. She said she recalled Young running by with what looked like a revolver tucked away.

``What happened?`` Tyson said she yelled.

```Ain`t nothing happened. Ain`t nothing happened,``` she said Young said. The suspect kept on running, she said.

Janet Woods, 33, testified that Young told her the night of the incident, ``Let`s go rob somebody.``

She declined. ``I told him he was crazy to ask me something like that,`` she said.

Young`s defense team attempted to question the credibility of witnesses.